Beyond the Fringe [Import]

Various Artists (Artist) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 27, 2001)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: EMI Gold Imports
• ASIN: B00005NMVN
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #401,395 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Steppes In The Right Direction

2. Man Bites God

3. The Sadder And Wiser Beaver

4. Aftermyth Of War / The Way To The Stars / Lili Mar

5. The Suspense Is Killing Me

6. Porn Shop

7. The Death Of Lord Nelson

8. Sitting On The Bench

9. Bread Alone

10. The End Of The World

11. Home Thoughts From Abroad

12. The English Way Of Death

13. One Leg Too Few

14. Lord Cobbold / The Duke (Studio Five Interviews)

15. The Great Train Robbery

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The show without which Python could never have been, December 12, 2003

By 

Gavin Wilson - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Beyond the Fringe (Audio CD)

It has taken me a long time to get around to BtF. I guess it was the suits that put me off. Maybe I heard one of their Shakespeare parodies at an impressionable age, and decided this intellectual humour would never be for me. And Alan Bennett simply struck me as too whiny ever to be a comic hero.

What made me take a second look at BtF, and give it a fair hearing, was Eric Idle saying in the audio CD version of 'The Pythons by the Pythons' that he worshipped BtF, bought the record, and memorised all the sketches. Which is precisely what I did with the Python routines back in the 1970s.

Some of these BtF sketches are classics that continued to be resurrected -- and improved upon -- in the 'Secret Policeman's Ball' era of the 1970s. Back in 1961, Peter Cook's EL Wisty tone was still evolving as he told the story of why he never became a judge. Dudley Moore's one-legged Tarzan, although clearly having a ball here, needed to be appreciated visually to get the full impact -- which is what you get on the recently issued Amnesty International DVDs.

Indeed Dudley is the greatest revelation here. His piano-playing and lieder mickey-takes are virtuoso performances. Forget his mucking about in 'Arthur' and his always playing second fiddle to Peter Cook's lead. Here Dudley really is the business.

There are other BtF sketches not included in this package -- such as Cook's brilliant impersonation of Macmillan, and Miller's imitation of Russell getting the better of Moore over a bag of apples -- which illustrate Python's debt to BtF. (I dount whether we would ever have had the professional logician's analysis of the witch's trial on the OST of 'Holy Grail', if BtF hadn't first done Russell versus Moore.)

The BtF show played for years in the West End, and went on to New York's Broadway. Apparently a new cast took over in 1962, but it's impossible to imagine anyone else coming close to the performance standard of these sketches.

As has been remarked elsewhere, the sound quality of these recordings is not brilliant. Actually the engineer seemed to take more care to pick up Dudley's piano than to getting the dialogue accurately recorded.

But this CD is a classic document, and really ought to be in the CD library of anyone interested in the line of Oxbridge humour that started with this, and went on to Monty Python, the Goodies (unfortunately), Fry and Laurie, and Blackadder.

The humour is fairly literary -- with some allusions to classical mythology. I'm not sure that today's typical comedy audience would appreciate all the references.

8 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Caveat emptor, June 19, 2002

By 

Jeffrey N. Massie (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Beyond the Fringe (Audio CD)

I should say that I don't own this album, but based on the listing above -- if it's accurate -- it omits several of the best BTF sketches, such as So That's The Way You Like it (the satire of Olivier-style talkingShakespeareveryveryfast), Dudley Moore's parodies of Britten and Weill, and Peter Cook's Harold Macmillan imitation. These are all included on the other BTF CD available, which is more expensive but has three times more material.

As to the previous criticism, the very point of BTF is its Britishness; if you don't "get it" I recommend Minnie Pearl or Prairie Home Companion ;) ...

4.0 out of 5 stars Still Funny!, May 29, 2010

By 

Teri W. Leibforth "Ms. Esq." (Clarkdale, AZ United States) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Beyond the Fringe (Audio CD)

For fans of early British humor and pre-Monty Python, this is worth including in your collection, even though the quality of the recording is not the best. With his college friends, my husband saw a production in Chicago during the "Fringe" American tour. Several sketches he saw in the original show are not on this recording, and he misses those. But this brings back fond memories, and many laughs, of that live performance.